WOW they are crazy

Chris Matthews is half the fool he was many years ago, and he can only manage the same-minded, and kiss-ups from the NBCs, on his Sunday show, I notice. He is unfunny, yet insists on being "funny" and has his own fawning pals, like some has-been comic who still somehow garners big paychecks. Stunning just how far NBC and MSNBC have plummeted into so much of the one-sided commentary and misleading so-called "journalism".

I guess they THINK they are the anti-Fox News, but that's such a joke, and I despise bias on either side, take it personally that the self-centered liberals ruined (for me) what I had once hoped would be and considered to be my career industry.

Fox News is red with embarrassment for MSNBC, due to how clear their bias is on discussion and commentary shows. Janeane Garofalo was on Olbermann weeks ago, was the most offensive I've caught (on YouTube or somewhere) any of these horrendous soap-box Hollywood liberals ever be in a highly public stage (word gets around about the crazy talk, but this was there on the show itself, not an anecdote). (She was thrashing Tea Parties as being purely, simply full of anti-black racists, that the whole thing was not at all about taxes, gov't spending, or anything, just an excuse for rednecks to be racist in public. Stunning, horrible, offensive, miserably out of her element idiot, she is.)

After that humorless tirade, I eagerly wanted to see her whiney little computer geek character on "24" this season die -- just for some joyous make-believe comeuppance. (I was disappointed.) I'm sure she is dead ... on the inside. Sure seems like it. Certainly, mentally, she's thoroughly contorted.

I don't have cable now, thanks to some tough months, and I don't think I want it back. Just limits me to a few channels and HULU, etc., online, and keeps me away from the moodily pontificating boobs on news programs. I can live with that. Did that while I lived elsewhere, for most of the years. Healthy!

So... Newsweek. Gag! They had that truly lame effort to sell magazines, "We are all Socailists now". It was a nothing article. I read it online. Like a fart in church, and not even a loud one. Har!

TIME is another great example of a pack of fawning roadies doing magazines. I had subscription for a year -- got it sorta free (NWA flight miles were to expire, so we got lots of magazines). I was eager to see it end after all the stupid adoration this year! You;d think it was exaggerating, but I was seeing it in every issue, just about. Amusing, were it not for so many go-along sheep believing what these drunken shepherds tell them to believe.

You should catch, online somewhere, the McLaughlin Group show of this past week, and the way Eleanor Clift of NEWSWEEK was going with both fists in favor of Obama and his apology tour of Arab nations and such. Simply stunning, how cozy it seems so many are in MSM -- with a utopian myopia.

My decision of late is to avoid the news as much as possible. I know what I know, let the loud mouths ruin someone else's day, not mine. Local news, I read some stuff online, and otherwise, the world can rot. For now. I needed a loooong breather from the divisiveness that the election and the economic crisis has brought out. It is too much about amateur pontificating on subjects, rather than interviews with true experts.

Saw rerun of the March 2009 interview with Federal Reserve Bank Chairman Ben Bernanke on 60 Minutes (also can catch that online), which I avoided first time it aired. Was the most plainspoken, fact-involving, emotions involved but not hysterical thing on the economy I've seen in a long, long time. It made sense, and he seemed sincere. Stunning, seeing what he is and what he's up against. For me, with a view from business education and long interest in economic things, it was a very good perspective to hear. He is THE MAN on economic matters, and far more "safe" than blowhards like Obama, etc.

We need more professionals, like Bernanke, and less blowhards, in every walk of life. Especially as essential leaders.

Just some of my thoughts of late.

- jR, aka AirFarceOne (on Twitter)

News stories: there's journalism, and then there's 'Romper Room' reports

I listened to 60 Minutes of in my car this past Sunday, since my local CBS affiliate happens to be the one who airs across FM 87.7 in my area (the one assured TV channel on FM radio across all markets, as far as I know). I think I got more out of it by purely listening to it (while 60 Minutes is not a jumpy or distracting video broadcast).

That said, listening to this TV show on a radio reminded me of why TV news is so often shallow, while reports such as those on 60 Minutes actually do what journalism ought to do: tell a story. Good news media does not just create a sound byte that's as throwaway as many 140-character Twitter posts.

Listening to local TV news on the radio would be nauseating. That CBS show is still worth listening to, on several levels.

- jR

Economy of Scale in Change in the Country: Politics, political parties, media influence, 'popularity' opinion

Interregnum: a beautifully Latin term for "leadership vacancy" (see definition).

This first segment was written in the context of the market meltdown ...

'My final newspaper article' - Dan Connelly on Xark!

Shumaker, the real-life model for the comic-strip character Shu, was a walking indoctrination into a culture of journalism that once held sway in America: Confident, straight-talking, blue-collar, irreverent, abrasive — but also undeniably talented and privately idealistic.

That's good stuff. And exactly what journalism is NOT any longer, except with rarity, in local dailies or TV, or in national dailies ("national" meaning stuff like USA Today and Wall Street Journal, but of course that includes LA Times, Miami Herald, New York Times, Washtingon Post, Washington Times, Chicago Tribune and the likes).

The above is ironic to me, but in a good way: I figure there are moderate-to-liberal and/or Democrat journalists just as discouraged by the left-leaning, ass-kiss reporting that exists in the print and TV media now (they are also likely as put off by the stubborn success of right-wing, conservative talk radio). I've also felt that another reason journalism is in the crapper, at dailies, etc., is because there is a tempest that leans heavily to to left -- in newspapers and TV (especially TV!). If people begin to avoid major newspapers and newspaper sites, and the same with major TV and their sites, it is little wonder why: it is skewed in generally one direction, and dishonestly. That is, it is skewed to the left, and does not admit it.

How HIGHLY I would hold people if they could, for a change, be self-realized enough to simply identify their own views. There's no doubt who Limbaugh speaks for: strong right conservatives, but not far, far right evangelicals. If you bothered to listen, you would be this. There is plenty of questions about whose world Katie Couric comes from, Campbell Brown, Keith Olbermann and many, many others.

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The Future of The Republican Party « Jon Taplin’s Blog
Chris Buckley, son of the founder of modern conservative thought William Buckley, just announced he was going to vote for Obama, partly because the right wing kooks scared the bejesus out of him.

My colleague, the superb and very dishy Kathleen Parker, recently wrote in National Review Online a column stating what John Cleese as Basil Fawlty would call “the bleeding obvious”: namely, that Sarah Palin is an embarrassment, and a dangerous one at that. She’s not exactly alone. New York Times columnist David Brooks, who began his career at NR, just called Governor Palin “a cancer on the Republican Party.”

As for Kathleen, she has to date received 12,000 (quite literally) foam-at-the-mouth hate-emails. One correspondent, if that’s quite the right word, suggested that Kathleen’s mother should have aborted her and tossed the fetus into a Dumpster. There’s Socratic dialogue for you. Dear Pup once said to me sighfully after a right-winger who fancied himself a WFB protégé had said something transcendently and provocatively cretinous, “You know, I’ve spent my entire life time separating the Right from the kooks.”

Parker earlier (Sept 26) wrote the following:

Palin Problem - Kathleen Parker on National Review Online

Some of the passionately feminist critics of Palin who attacked her personally deserved some of the backlash they received. But circumstances have changed since Palin was introduced as just a hockey mom with lipstick — what a difference a financial crisis makes — and a more complicated picture has emerged.

As we’ve seen and heard more from John McCain’s running mate, it is increasingly clear that Palin is a problem. Quick study or not, she doesn’t know enough about economics and foreign policy to make Americans comfortable with a President Palin should conditions warrant her promotion.

Yes, she recently met and turned several heads of state as the United Nations General Assembly convened in New York. She was gracious, charming and disarming. Men swooned. Pakistan’s president wanted to hug her. (Perhaps Osama bin Laden is dying to meet her?)

And, yes, she has common sense, something we value. And she’s had executive experience as a mayor and a governor, though of relatively small constituencies (about 6,000 and 680,000, respectively).

Finally, Palin’s narrative is fun, inspiring and all-American in that frontier way we seem to admire. When Palin first emerged as John McCain’s running mate, I confess I was delighted. She was the antithesis and nemesis of the hirsute, Birkenstock-wearing sisterhood — a refreshing feminist of a different order who personified the modern successful working mother.

Palin didn’t make a mess cracking the glass ceiling. She simply glided through it.

It was fun while it lasted.

Palin’s recent interviews with Charles Gibson, Sean Hannity, and now Katie Couric have all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate. Who Is Clearly Out Of Her League.

No one hates saying that more than I do.

McCain can’t repudiate his choice for running mate. He not only risks the wrath of the GOP’s unforgiving base, but he invites others to second-guess his executive decision-making ability. Barack Obama faces the same problem with Biden.

OUCH! Clearly, while Palin was suited to the evangelical set, McCain perhaps didn't think it through thoroughly enough regarding the more, umm, grounded members of the party.

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Campbell Brown: use of middle name 'race-baiting'; dumb-baiting is OK

Commentary: Race-baiting wrong, but so is over-reaction - CNN.com

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Look everybody, we all know we are in uncharted territory here. Never before has there been an African-American presidential nominee. So without question, race is going to be a part of the conversation.

Race-baiting doesn't have to be and yet it is happening in this campaign. Twice this week, surrogates for Republican candidate Sen. John McCain have made a point of calling Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama, Barack "Hussein" Obama.

The implication here is clear. It's foreign sounding. It's Muslim sounding. It's un-American sounding. It's dangerous-sounding. What it is, is race-baiting. And that is what is dangerous.

Incredibly, Brown said this in a "No bias, no bull" commentary during her show, "Election Center". It ought to be called "Election Left", not center. Yet she says the "implication" is "clear"? What a screwy, classless PR job she's doing for the Obama campaign! To someone who lacks her - either closed-minded or intentionally ironic - bias, this was a glorious bait-and-switch effort to cast a bad light on McCain by knee-jerk political correctness and hypocrisy of the finest sort.

First, how is it that Hussein is foreign, yet Barack Obama does not sound that way? Wha? What Brown could not say, somehow, is that Obama's middle name is Saddam's last name, and that is the real reason the use of it sets off Obama fans. It is as if fate itself is going to force this man into the White House, despite a lack of leadership, military work, or even ever having run something aside from his campaigns.

What liberals are frightened of - I can only guess as I do not consider myself very liberal about much of anything - is that using "Hussein" will turn some simpletons otherwise sold on the two-year-old national politician Obama. This is a bit ironic - tragic, even - since Obama cannot seem to be first to comment on anything, including his own friendships and policies.

Why not just come out with it, Campbell Brown: Stop adding to the fakery managed so well by the Obama campaign and say, of the middle name, "it sounds like an enemy's name" instead of putting up the sensational term "race-baiting". Air your real worry rather than adding to the misinformation. Stop, for goodness sake, stop taking shots at McCain for these folks who are doing what? using Obama's given name against him? That is absurd for all but the most simple-minded. Absurd!

If people can hurt Obama's chances with his own middle name, he is way too insecure to be worthy of the Oval Office. You are servicing liberals by joining in that crazy talk, and ought to be brought out into the light as a propoganda voice of theirs, plain and simple. Of, get the act straight and stop playing to their tune.

This reminds me that Brown was only a burgeoning national face as an NBC desk anchor a few years ago. She replaced the coldly dumped Paula Zahn (disappeared without a trace months earlier), who was not so good, either, in my opinion. Zahn was dropped without a peep, so I guess I am not alone in feeling that way. It appears that CNN is convinced the 8 pm hour must have a woman who better suits an entertainment reporter, doing news that is far too deep for their thinking.

To her credit, Brown did have a clue about something that Larry King, the king of call-it-in hosting, couldn't grasp (see prior post). Thanks for this goes in part to her grandfather:

But let's also be careful here and use our heads. Some Obama supporters on the left are up in arms over something McCain said at the debate Tuesday night -- when he referred to Obama as, "that one."

McCain: It was an energy bill on the floor of the senate, loaded down with goodies. Billions for the oil companies. And it was sponsored by Bush and Cheney. You know who voted for it? Might never know. That one.

Some people have interpreted that comment as having racial undertones. Give me a break.

With that, there's some hope for her. Consistency? Not a chance. Good writing? Umm, no. But some slim glimmer of hope that she just might pull out a decent piece of journalism now and then.

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McCain referred to a black man as "that one"! That PIG!

First: WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU MEDIA MORONS?

Second: CNN is no longer just reporting the news, they are trying to get others to report on non-stories via Larry King. This is verbatim from the site article about the interview. What non-story depths have they fallen? This is bad even for King. (This is just the beginning for today, since Campbell Brown, an expert on not only babbling at GOP spokesmen, but also race-baiting, states that using Barack Obama's middle name - Hussein - is pure and simple "race baiting". See next post.)

Michelle Obama not offended by 'that one' comment - CNN.com

The wife of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama told CNN's Larry King on Wednesday that she is not offended by a much-publicized comment made toward her husband in Tuesday night's debate.

In the presidential matchup at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, GOP nominee John McCain criticized his Democratic rival for supporting the 2007 Bush-Cheney energy bill.

"It was an energy bill on the floor of the Senate, loaded down with goodies, billions for oil companies, and it was sponsored by Bush and Cheney. ... You know who voted for it? You might never know. That one," he said, gesturing toward Obama. "You know who voted against it? Me."

Coming up on CNN:
Tonight on Larry King! "Lint! Does its color matter in this election?" We ask the "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" hosts, and special guest, Donald Trump. Tune in for an exciting and highly relevant hour of discussion.

MSNBC struggles with political coverage reality and loses

'Olbermonotony' crisis has been significantly reduced, according to MSNBC report

The place: MSNBC.
The item: major election and political news anchoring.
The jilted babblers: Chris "I do not act just like that guy on SNL" Matthews and Keith "I used to be on ESPN just like Craig Kilborn!" Olbermann.

Yes, in a disturbingly conscientious move that can only be categorized as FUNNY for all conservatives and respectable journalists, these two bigmouths have been tossed from the political landscape: One is an egotistical and demented blusterer of extreme liberal bias and wagon-circling who seems to be OK with publicly obsessing over Bill O'Reilly, the other is a likeable and less embarrassing candle bearer for Democrats who is recently being dragged down to the first one's level.

Thus, two of the most important opinion-shapers ever to put on makeup, fiddle with earpieces, get a little too friendly with Ariana Huffington during an interview, and make millions per year while shoving their childish opinions in viewers' faces, have been displaced. That these two were ever put behind the same huge desk is comparable to Hepburn and Tracy, or Dumb and Dumber, depending on your criteria.

If your criteria is journalism, then MSNBC made the right move.

If your criteria is entertainment, then you are sorely disappointed by this move. You consolement can be found on Internet replays of his "best" stuff.

If you are Keith Olbermann's significant other or his dog, you are in for a very rough week of paranoid ranting coming from the bed, shower, hall closet, and kitchen pantry.

This could be a promising boost Chris Matthews. Considered a respectable though liberally biased newsman until he was given the seat next to his now-former co-anchor, he has begun to speak like a junior high "Most Popular" candidate trying to win over his shinier-faced pal when he's with the glassy-eyed Olbermann. I hope Matthews has enough sense to count his blessings, despite his inability to act like a man around Olbermann's pathologically confident perfect-hair personage.

Aside from when Fox News Channel launched -- touting its fair and balanced claims though they are generally leaning right -- this unselfish act by MSNBC of admitting bias and slightly downgrading its cause may be the most notable thing to happen since CNN first put out a signal that said "look out major networks, it's a 24-hour news world out there, and we're going to give you at least three hours of it!"


On the other hand, Microsoft just launched a major new advertising campaign, and the MS in MSNBC of course means Microsoft. So this could be all part of Microsoft's master plan to become a more likable, affable and tolerable provider of consumer and business technology.

"I am a PC, and I think Olbermann sucks."

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MSNBC struggles with political coverage reality, and liberal monotony loses

'Olbermonotony' crisis has been greatly reduced, according to MSNBC report


The place: MSNBC.

The issue: major election and political news anchoring.

The jilted gabbers:
> Chris "I do not act just like that guy on SNL" Matthews
> Keith "I used to be on ESPN just like Craig Kilborn!" Olbermann


Yes, in a disturbingly conscientious move that can only be categorized as FUNNY for all conservatives and respectable journalists, these two bigmouths have been tossed from the political landscape: One is an egotistical and demented blusterer of extreme liberal bias and wagon-circling who seems to be OK with publicly obsessing over Bill O'Reilly, the other is a likeable and less embarrassing candle bearer for Democrats who is recently being dragged down to the first one's level.

Thus, two of the most important opinion-shapers ever to put on makeup, fiddle with earpieces, get a little too friendly with Ariana Huffington during an interview, and make millions per year while shoving their childish opinions in viewers' faces, have been displaced. That these two were ever put behind the same huge desk is comparable to Hepburn and Tracy, or Dumb and Dumber, depending on your criteria.

If your criteria is jouralism, then MSNBC made the right move.

If your criteria is entertainment, then you are sorely disappointed by this move. You consolement can be found on Internet replays of his "best" stuff.

If you are Keith Olbermann's significant other or dog, you are in for a very rough week of paranoid ranting coming from the bed, shower, hall closet, and kitchen pantry.


This could be a promising boost for Chris Matthews. Considered a respectable yet liberally biased newsman -- until he was given the seat next to his now-former co-anchor Olbermann-- Matthews began to speak like a junior high "Most Popular" candidate trying to win over his shinier-faced pal when he was with the glassy-eyed ESPN alumna. I hope Matthews has enough sense to count his blessings in this turn of events.

Aside from when Fox News Channel launched -- touting its fair and balanced claims though they are generally leaning right -- this unselfish act by MSNBC of admitting bias and slightly downgrading its cause may be the most notable thing to happen since CNN first put out a signal that said "look out major networks, it's a 24-hour news world out there, and we're going to give you at least three hours of it!"

On the other hand, Microsoft just launched a major new advertising campaign, and the MS in MSNBC is of course meaing Microsoft ... so this could be all part of Microsoft's master plan to become a more likable, affable and tolerable provider of consumer and business technology.

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When the going gets tough, attack WTC... figuratively

New Orleans Mayor Takes Swipe At NYC, Nagin Cites Failure To Rebuild Ground Zero While Defending Katrina Clean-Up - CBS News

Ahh it was only two years ago that Ray Nagin confirned what many suspected in 2005: he's a jerk. It is hard to believe that one mayor could make such an spectable of his callousness, especially in a national TV interview, but then, Ray Nagin is no ordinary mayor. He's mayor of Chocolate City, as he put it.

In late August 2006, the first anniversary of the destruction of Katrina, Nagin found a reason to deflect questions of logistics and leadership away from himself and onto the Big Apple. Apparently the nearly instant death of almost 4,000 people is not even sacred to this man of the people. The chocolate people. Does that mean he thinks everone is an Oompa Loompa in Nola? For that matter, isn't Hershey, Pennsylvania, the Chocolate City? New Orleans is more like the Bare Breasts for Fake Pearls City, or the Bourbon City. How about the Southern Comfort City? That's where Southern Comfort was created, after all! (OK. I'll stop.)

(CBS) Confronted by accusations that he’s taking too long to clean up his city after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin defended himself by remarking on New York City’s failure to rebuild Ground Zero.

Nagin made the remarks in an interview conducted by CBS News National Correspondent Byron Pitts. (Click here)

Remember, New Orleans reelected him. He has had a chance to do it better, as everyone has, with Gustav, which luckily didn't create the misery that reached Katrina-sizes levels. So far, so good. Fortunately, not just the leaders learned a lesson from Katrina: folks respect nature a bit more after that one.

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